Sin Eater
by Lola Pennington
Summary: A plunge into the town that takes all. It's not like she anticipated this. Wow, this is old. Always nice to go back and read some early stuff.
1. Chapter One

A few notes before we begin:  
  
For a lack of good formatting on Fanfiction.net, italics will be denoted with single quotes. ('This should be in italics,' Hazel thought, 'but it won't because Fanfiction.net is mean.')  
  
Rated R because Hazel and a few other people are just potty mouths.  
  
I like reviews, especially constructive criticism. Anything to help me grow as a writer is appreciated. Thank you.  
  
*** *** *** ***  
  
'Sin. Again.'  
  
'Before before before. Leaving the body.'  
  
The blinds over the window were opened barely enough so the high street lamps constantly dashing by the train's window stung Hazel's eyes with bright pinpricks of light. She stirred and straightened, arching her back and inhaling deeply with a yawn. Her eyes stung with moisture built up as she'd slept, and she mopped it away with the backs of her hands. Beneath her, the car of the train murmured gently, and around her, people slept or watched the ceiling, eyes stricken with aggravation at their inability to sleep. Hazel pushed the headphones over her ears down to cling to the back of her neck and pushed herself up in her chair, careful to not disturb the elderly lady who dozed in the seat next to her.  
  
'What? No. Leaving the body.'  
  
'Sin Eater.'  
  
She dug a pack of Virginia Slims from the pocket inside her coat and put the cigarette to her lips. The Slims went back into her pocket and a lighter left in their place, flicked on, and went back in. The cigarette smoldered at the tip and glared orange for a moment as Hazel took a deep drag. Worry struck her for a moment, and she glanced to the woman snoozing next to her, but she seemed unfazed by the smoke. Hazel settled again in her chair to face the front, dropped an arm over her stomach, and put use to the free arm as she drew the cigarette from her lips and let out a stream of smoke.  
  
'Sin Eater.'  
  
'Eat.'  
  
She didn't quite enjoy smoking, but the habit wouldn't break.  
  
'Burn.'  
  
'Where did that come from?'  
  
The train rumbled on beneath her, and Hazel rested against the seat, closing her eyes. Ah, there it was, the sweet menthol and tar concoction settling in her lungs.  
  
'Ugh.' Hazel hated it.  
  
She took another sip of the menthol air, dragging and dragging until the cigarette was reduced to a useless butt. The remaining embers died as she ground the cigarette butt into the ashtray.  
  
"No smoking," she murmured, reading the lettering embossed across the ashtray's supports. "Then what's the point of the ashtray? Trashcan?"  
  
She flipped the miniature metal container back up against the seat and resisted the urge to remove a second cigarette. No, it wouldn't do, it wasn't aiding her plans to quit at all, but then again, neither was the first cigarette.  
  
But who gave a damn. She was going to die someday, anyway.  
  
The second cigarette was just as good as the first. The woman next to Hazel coughed and stirred. Hazel sighed through her nose, raised her eyebrows a little in frustration, and dampened the cigarette into the No Smoking ashtray.  
  
'Sin Eater. Make it stop.'  
  
At first, the screech was too faint for Hazel to be dead sure she was hearing anything, but when it rose to the deafening, ear-splitting roar, Hazel knew something was wrong. Deep-sleeping people around her had woken, a child was bawling his eyes out, a baby screaming, and the murmur of worried voices was barely audible beneath the din of the train.  
  
The train was stopping. Hazel raked a hand through her chocolate-colored hair and held it there, off her forehead. The train was stopping, that was it. She had no idea why, of course, but there were an infinite amount of theories. She sat up and turned around slightly, wincing as her   
  
spine popped.  
  
'Great. What a coincidence. Only the second time in my life I've been on a train, and for the second time, it's had to stop halfway to the destination.'  
  
Train stewards were beginning to move through the cars now, stopping people and pushing them back into their seats, telling them that everything was fine, the train just needed to stop, the noise would die down soon. Hazel settled back into her chair and began to remove a third cigarette, then remembered NO SMOKING would most likely be enforced by the stewards. For the second time, she exhaled through her nose and raised her eyebrows in minor aggravation. Her fingers itched to grip the familiar Virginia slims again, and her lungs were burning, screaming, "More menthol, more menthol."  
  
Nah. She could hold off. For a little while, anyway,  
  
The train jolted forward. Hazel's head connected hard with the seat in front of her, and her back ached from the impact it felt with the hard chair behind her. "Ow," she muttered blandly. Her pain was mutual, though. She heard other people murmuring from the pain of the impact.  
  
The noise had ceased, at least. Hazel scratched behind her ears and leaned gingerly against the chair, mildly aware of the bruising that was beginning to form on her back where she slammed against the chair.  
  
Beside her, the elderly woman had dozed off again. Hazel raised her eyebrows at her, then turned away. On the pretense of finding a restroom, she stood and began sliding past people, moving northwards on the train, until she reached a close ambit towards the steward's car on the train. Unfortunately, several other people had followed suit before her, and there was a line five people too long leading towards the restroom.  
  
'Nosy bitches,' Hazel though, then laughed when she realized she was just as nosy as the bitches waiting in line in front of her.  
  
"They called from the Silent Hill and Maheya station. Said there was some huge, deformed dead animal on the track and they couldn't budge it. Said it would do more damage to the train...probably derail it."  
  
"Good thing they called us in time."  
  
"No kidding," Hazel muttered under her breath. It was all she needed to know. She drew a cigarette from her pocket and held it up to her lips, then pocketed it again quickly when a stewardess threw her a sharp glare. "Sorry," she muttered, cocking an eyebrow and looking at the floor.  
  
White noise.  
  
Hazel winced. White noise, piercing her ears and making her brain scream. Where the hell was it coming from? She groaned and stumbled out of the line.  
  
Someone giggled. "I didn't know they served alcohol on the train. The ride must be more fun drunk."  
  
"I'm not drunk," Hazel snapped, massaging her temples angrily. 'Stupid bitch.' She kept the thought to herself as she moved carefully back to her seat, the fuzzy noise still blaring in her ears. Why didn't anyone else hear it?  
  
Voices were rising above the noise. Faint, faint screams. Hazel wondered if it was just the buzzing. "That thing-what the hell, it's coming alive-it just killed that woman-stay in the train, that thing will kill you-it's moving down the track-"  
  
"Some kind of monster-"  
  
Something piercing her mind above the white noise. It was a scream for sure. "It's huge-- we'll never be able to stop that thing-- oh my god it's killing everything it sees-- what the hell is going on-"  
  
Hazel blinked. With a sweeping of wind, the noise was gone, leaving her skull feeling awkwardly empty. She inhaled deeply and, ignoring the stewards and workers around her, drew a cigarette out of her pocket and held it to her lips with trembling fingers. She fumbled with the lighter, dropping it several times before she set the tip of the cigarette to smoldering.  
  
The train jolted, knocking Hazel forward for the second time, and began rumbling forward. The cigarette slipped from her fingers and to the floor. Hazel ground it into the carpet out of sheer frustration and slammed herself back into the chair.  
  
"Ow."  
  
She regretted it instantly as her back set to aching. Like dominoes, her head began to ache just after her back, triggered by the screeching the train gave off as it began to move.  
  
Moving?  
  
'Monster,' Hazel thought. 'Are we heading right towards an inferno? ...No...I was just hearing things.  
  
"Monster!" someone screamed. Hazel's eyes snapped open, but she seemed to be the only person that noticed the outburst. She glanced around as far as she could without craning her neck.  
  
"It's a monster...oh my god, oh my god..."  
  
No. It was the noise in her head again, like a broken radio.  
  
"Knock it off," Hazel muttered.  
  
"Sorry," the sleeping lady next to her murmured. Hazel choked, slightly shocked as the woman spoke, then she realized the woman was speaking in her sleep.  
  
"Not you," she murmured.  
  
"Sorry," the woman muttered in reply, then snorted.  
  
Hazel turned away from her and rubbed her head. It seemed the stronger she tried to will the noise away, the louder it became. 'My head hurts like a motherfucker...I need a cigarette...'  
  
Somebody screamed again. The voice was all too real. Hazel jumped, but so did most of the people around her.  
  
It was real.  
  
This time as the train stopped, there was no screeching. Just a sudden, powerful and painful jolt that sent bodies flying over chairs, crashing into walls, through windows. Hazel's shoulder collided painfully with the ground of the aisle. She gritted her teeth. Whatever gave off the white noise that tormented her so seemed to have moved right into her head, burning and screaming at her ears. She screamed, and she wasn't the only one.  
  
There was another jolt, and Hazel's body left the ground. She was flung up, then crashed into the door at the very end of the car. It shuddered against the onslaught of her body.  
  
The third jolt lifted the very train from its tracks. Hazel felt her feet lift the ground for the third time. Beneath the noise in her ears, glass shattered, and when she was aware of things again, she was face up in a patch of soft grass, her body too pained to move. 


	2. Chapter Two

Before he even held the blaring receiver to his ear, a lurch in the pit of his stomach told Officer Jacob Wells that this would be the seventh call to report a missing person in short amount of November that had passed.  
  
"My daughter has gone missing."  
  
Before he could even speak. Jacob Wells raised his eyebrows at Jessie Boyle, seated adjacent to him, and kicked his legs up on the desk.  
  
"What's her name?"  
  
"Hazel Halliwell."  
  
Jacob hesitated, then tugged open the drawer at his side and drew out a thick sheaf of tidy papers strapped into a yellow file. "Ma'am..."  
  
There was no reply as he removed the rubber band binding the papers to the folder and flipped through the first few sheets. "We already have a report for Miss Halliwell...Did you say you were her mother?"  
  
No reply. Jacob frowned.  
  
"Are you her stepmother, then? This report is from one of her professors from her college. They say her mother is dead. Ma'am?"  
  
The dial tone met his ears. Jacob sighed through his nose and set the receiver back onto the phone.  
  
"What happened?" It was Jessie speaking.  
  
Jacob shrugged. "Remember our last call on a missing girl was for that Hazel Halliwell girl?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"I just got another call for her from some lady saying she was her mother."  
  
"And her mother is supposed to be dead?"  
  
"Exactly." Jacob shrugged. The phone rang again and he groaned.  
  
"I'll get it," Jessie muttered, punching a button on the phone and holding the receiver up to her ear. "Portland Missing Person's Department, this is Officer Boyle...Yes sir...Yes sir. What's her name, sir? ...Is that with a 'k' or a 'c'? ...Catherine McCarver. ...Eighteen years old? All right."  
  
Jessie raised her eyes to Jacob and frowned.  
  
"Light blond hair...blue eyes...fair skinned...five foot three, a hundred nine pounds..." She murmured to herself as she copied the details onto a fresh Missing Person's Report. "Thank you, sir. We'll send out alerts and begin to look for her immediately. ...I'm not authorized to disclose any information on that rumor, sir. ...thank you, sir." She hung up the phone and glared at Jacob. "Now how do you suppose he knew about all the girls that have gone missing?"  
  
Jacob shrugged. "Word gets around. My lips have been sealed from the start."  
  
"They've called in a detective, right?"  
  
"Sort of. Apparently Gentry managed to slip all these missing people into a conversation with the cave man at Augusta. Turns out they've been having the same problem ever since September, so they've sent a detective down to look at what all we've got so far."  
  
"Took them long enough," Jessie muttered. "All those girls are probably dead by now."  
  
"Hey, that kind of pessimism won't get you anywhere." Jacob smiled a little, then jumped as the door to the department he and Jessie occupied slammed open and into a wall. "Gentry." He stood, addressing his superior. "You look a little miffed. What's wrong?"  
  
"I need all the reports we've taken since the beginning of November."  
  
"Here." He tapped the sheaf of paper against his desk to straighten them out and snapped the rubber band around them to hold them together.  
  
"This one was just called in," Jessie began, offering the report on McCarver, Catherine to Gentry.   
  
Gentry glanced at it shortly. "You come with me, Boyle."  
  
"Yes, sir." She stood up.  
  
"Bring that report."  
  
"Yes, sir."  
  
"Wells, stay in here so you can take any more calls that might come in."  
  
"Yes, sir," Jacob muttered. Halfheartedly he returned the small wave Jessie gave him as she left the room.  
  
The phone rang again. "Portland Missing Person's Department, this is Officer Wells...yes..." He hesitated, the sat the phone carefully in its cradle and left the room after Gentry and Boyle.  
  
"Mr. Boyle," he called. The aging man turned to face him. Jessie, ahead of him, turned as well.  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"They've found a body."  
  
Gentry studied Jacob's face, then removed his glasses and cleaned them on the hem of his shirt. "Who has?"  
  
"The detective from Augusta."  
  
"Why the hell did he call you?"  
  
"He said it was the only number he had."  
  
Gentry replaced his glasses. "All right. Go back and keep watching for calls, Wells. Boyle, I still need you to come with me."  
  
"Yes, sir," Jacob said, then returned to the department. Jessie trailed after Gentry's large steps down the hall.  
  
"Any particular reason why I'm going with you, Mr. Gentry?"  
  
"I'm sending you along with Detective Elwood."  
  
"Who?"  
  
"Denver Elwood. He's the cop from Augusta."  
  
"May I ask where it is he's going that you're sending me along to?"  
  
"Northwest. In that general direction. Elwood has been pinning locations for a few hours and seems to think that everything is pointing in that direction, so he's stopping here for you, then driving down there to see if he finds any leads."  
  
"We're jumping into this awfully fast, don't you think?"  
  
"It's Augusta, not us."  
  
"Oh."  
  
Jessie bit her lip. "What do you think is going on, Mr. Gentry?"  
  
"Hell if I know, Boyle. I'd like to find out."  
  
*** ***  
  
The paltry, flickering light of a small fire crawled across the walls of the dark room that Hazel opened her eyes to. It took her long, painful moments to collect her bearings, but when the memory of the previous hours was brought to a little more than a handful of fuzz, she sat up and rubbed her dry eyes with her fingertips.  
  
She seemed to be alone, but, then again, she couldn't make out the room very well. Before she could fully take in her surroundings, the angry, painful pounding in her head drove her back against the bed, and she moaned in anguish.  
  
"She's still in pain," a young woman's concerned voice said. "Poor thing. I wish we had something that could help her."  
  
"We do, but it will only help if she agrees to take it."  
  
Hazel covered her eyes with her hands and pressed her palms against her eyes. The light around her that seeped into her eyes seemed to fade, and she drew her hands from her eyes, two figures stood over her. The figure on the right, a young woman, knelt, letting the light glare back into Hazel's eyes again. Hazel's arms went up again to cover her face.  
  
"Does your head hurt?" the woman asked.  
  
"Just a little bit," Hazel groaned. She inhaled through her nose and noticed a trace of something like a mixture of marijuana and opium in the air. 'Wonder which one's the druggy,' she mused.  
  
"Here." It was the man that spoke now. Hazel moved her arms back down, her eyes adjusted more to the light than they had been.  
  
"What is it?" she muttered. The smell she'd mistaken for opium and marijuana was closer now. It was something sweeter, like yellow trumpet flowers. It made her headache return with a force.  
  
A cigarette. Self-rolled, obviously. This man apparently hadn't rolled many before.  
  
"I don't smoke. Weed," she added, remembering the Virginia Slims in her jacket.  
  
"It's not marijuana," the woman said.  
  
"Drugs are bad," Hazel muttered, rolling over. Behind her, the two people spoke in hushed voices, then left the bedside.  
  
"We don't have any pain medication or anything like that," the young woman said.  
  
"So I heard," Hazel replied. "I'll be fine. Where am I?"  
  
"On the outskirts of Silent Hill." It was still the young woman.  
  
"Silent what?"  
  
"Hill."  
  
"Oh."  
  
"It sounds like you've never heard of it."  
  
"It sounds familiar, actually."  
  
"I thought you were headed there."  
  
"I was...I don't know where I was heading. I remember that I was on a train...and it collided with something."  
  
"It derailed."  
  
"What happened?"  
  
"I don't know. I heard the crash in the middle of the night, and when I got there, everyone but you was dead."  
  
Hazel's stomach lurched. The poor old woman sleeping in the seat beside her...  
  
"I mean...I imagine they were. There were three bodies outside the train, yours being one of them, and the other two were...very dead. The entire train was afire. I couldn't get in there and save people, but...well, no one was screaming."  
  
"That's nice to know," Hazel said blandly. Upon hearing no reply, she pushed on. "So...what's this Silent Hill place like?"  
  
The young woman's shadow turned away. "It's...hm...it's different."  
  
"Different? In a bad way?"  
  
"...it depends on how you like your vacation towns."  
  
'You're not one for vacations,' Hazel reminded herself, then wished she could remember something more useful than her liking to vacations. "How far away is it?"  
  
"Not far. I told you, we're on the outskirts of it."  
  
"Could I get some help there? Maybe get back to where I was?"  
  
"Where were you?"  
  
Both Hazel and the young woman jumped slightly as the man spoke. "I..." Hazel hugged the clean white sheets that covered her closer to her body. "I don't remember."  
  
"Well, it's not much use finding out how to get home if you don't know where you came from," the young woman said, almost shakily, turning back to Hazel.  
  
"Is your name Hazel Halliwell?" the man asked.  
  
"Yes," Hazel said. The man turned, and Hazel could nearly define his features for a moment, but he turned back into the shadow just as quickly, a vanilla-colored parcel his hand.  
  
"This is for you." The small box landed softly on her lap.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"A few things from your brother."  
  
"My brother," Hazel echoed, then picked up the letter and began to break the seal with her finger.  
  
"Don't open it yet," the man stopped her. "Not until you're out of here."  
  
"...okay," Hazel murmured, and began to tuck it into the inside pocket of her jacket. Her jacket, however, was gone.  
  
The young woman noticed the momentary confusion. "Most of your clothes were destroyed by the train wreck."  
  
"Um..." Hazel ran her hands along the parcel, but it was a plain cardboard box wrapped in paper. Nothing to be felt.  
  
"We've got clothes you can wear, though, when you're ready to go."  
  
"I'm ready to go now."  
  
"Don't you want to rest? It's only been about four hours since I... since we found you."  
  
"What time is it?"  
  
"Five thirty seven in the morning."  
  
"I'm good to go," Hazel muttered, sitting up and swinging her legs over the side of the bed. Instantly, her headache returned. "Ow."  
  
"Well...if you're sure..."  
  
"Yeah," Hazel muttered. "Can I get some clothes?"  
  
"Follow me."  
  
There was little need to follow the young woman, as she only led Hazel to a closet on the other end of the room. "Here. There are all my clothes, but we're about the same size. It's cold outside, so you'll want to wear multiple layers, I think." She stepped inside the closet, fumbled in the air for a moment until she found the chain leading to the light, and tugged on it gently.  
  
Hazel bit back a little gasp. While she wasn't scared, it was strange to see the young woman's face for the first time.  
  
'So much for "young woman." She's not even old enough to be a senior in high school.'  
  
She looked pale, too pale and sickly so, like she'd been bedridden for many long months. Strawberry blond hair that had once been full and lively was flat and stringy from a lack of care. Her blue eyes were tired, but still grasped an old liveliness that Hazel would hesitate to associate with her. The clothes she wore, an old, graying skirt that hung down to her ankles and a white, lacy-collared blouse made her look like a sick child who'd stayed at her grandmother's house for so long she'd run out of her own clothes. Her clothes, her old woman, Amish-esque clothing (as it seemed to Hazel), was much too large for her, hanging barely off her shoulders and hips.  
  
The girl shrugged a little and offered an apologetic smile before she left the closet and shut the door softly behind her.  
  
Hazel turned to the mirror, taking in her pallor with a frown. "Shit," she muttered. "I *look* like a train wreck." She was dressed in a plain pair of white pajamas streaked with red in several cuts across her body. Upon further inspection, she found the remnants of wounds from the train wreck. Not painful, but smarting. She raked a hand through her hair to smooth it, then another, then dragged both her hands through her hair for lack of a brush. The hair cooperated somewhat, untangling and rising to its full volume, but it was still unusually frizzy. Her face was whiter than usual, and her eyes looked dead. She rubbed her face vigorously, and her cheeks reddened.  
  
"That didn't help," she muttered, then turned on the clothing, anticipating the worst. While it wasn't quite as bad as she expected, she found only plain skirts, sweaters, and white blouses. On the wall behind her was a small selection of women's jackets. She couldn't fight back the feeling that this room was somewhere inside a strict church. A closer inspection on the clothing revealed a size smaller than she was used to wearing.  
  
'If these clothes are as big on that girl as the ones she's wearing now are, she probably things I'm a cow.'  
  
Thought somewhat fitting, the clothes she'd chosen were comfortable-the black skirt, falling not even to her knees, the long-sleeved blouse, black sweater, and long jacket that fell almost to the length of the skirt. For warmth's sake, she zipped up and buttoned the jacket completely, then chose a simple pair of double-knit stockings and the most comfortable, durable pair of shoes she saw-high, black snow boots.  
  
When she opened the door, the girl was waiting for her, the letter and a black beanie in her hand. "I thought this might help," she said, offering the beanie.  
  
"Thank you." Hazel stuffed it into her pocket. "I think I overdressed."  
  
"You should be fine. Can you move easily in it all?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Good."  
  
"Why do you ask?"  
  
"It'll help. Trust me." She seemed to hesitate. "You might be doing a lot of running."  
  
Hazel snorted. "Lots of monsters running about?"  
  
"Possibly." She held the package over.  
  
"I almost forgot that."  
  
"You're lucky I remembered it. You'll need it."  
  
"Um...do you have a map of the area or something?"  
  
"Yes. It's on the way out. I'll be walking you outside. So...follow me. Please."  
  
Hazel closed the closet door behind her and followed the girl out the second door in the room into a dark hallway.  
  
"You'll have to watch your step. There's a few inclines and uneven steps here and there."  
  
The first one caught Hazel's attention and flung her forward a few steps. "I noticed." She rubbed her nose, noticing the cold that began to pierce the air. "Are we heading up?"  
  
"Yes. This is a basement."  
  
"Are we in a church?"  
  
"How did you guess?"  
  
For the first time, Hazel caught traces of good humor in the girl's voice.  
  
The hall lasted for a while, though not unbearably long, and opened into a cathedral. Hazel coughed and rubbed her nose again. "It's freezing," she breathed.  
  
"It's snowing outside," the girl said. "Here, these are for you. I know James would never let you have them."  
  
She took Hazel by the wrist and dropped a small plastic baggy into her palm. "Painkillers for your headache," she said. "Make them last just in case your headache comes back."  
  
Hazel smiled a little. "Thanks."  
  
"Not at all. Just don't tell James. By the way, what was your name again?"  
  
"Hazel."  
  
"Hazel." The girl smiled.  
  
"Do I not get to know your name?" Hazel asked.  
  
"Sorry," the girl said. "I can't tell you. It's a secret."  
  
"A secret." Hazel snorted. "All right."  
  
The girl pointed to the open double doors behind the chapel's rows of benches. "Be careful," she said.  
  
"The map?"  
  
"It's nailed onto the door. You'll see it when you walk out."  
  
Hazel nodded slightly. "Thanks," she said softly.  
  
The girl studied Hazel's face, then embraced her quickly. "It's so good to see you again, but we must part ways."  
  
Before Hazel could reply, the girl left the room quickly, slamming the door and locking it behind her. Hazel watched the door, dumbfounded, then tried the handle softly, but it held.  
  
"Okay," she murmured. "She locked the door...what was that all about?"  
  
She turned away from the locked door and faced the open double doors across the room from her. In an oddly shaped clump on the stone floor in front of the doors, snow was gathering. Hazel reached into her pocket, felt the box, then removed the beanie and tugged it over her head. It fit loosely, but still hugged her head, warming her ears and holding her long bangs out of her face. She approached the door slowly down the center aisle of the benches and trudged through the snow, double back to the doors when she remembered the map.  
  
When the girl had said the map was nailed to the door, she hadn't lied. The map was printed onto a sheet of durable white cotton, mildly damp at the edges from snow. Hazel tugged gently on the map, but it wouldn't give. She tugged again, pressing her foot to the door to hold it in place. She finally gave one powerful tug and the cotton ripped, coming off into her hands, but she lost her balance and tumbled back into the snow.  
  
Hazel groaned and stood up, brushing the snow from her backside and smoothing the map against her thighs so she could read it. "Silent Hill," she murmured. "Silent Hill..."  
  
The church she stood in front of was circled on the map. Hazel drew her finger along the road that led into the main town on the map. It wasn't much at all, a town compromised of less than twenty roads along the side of a lake. It stretched along the side of the lake, however, encompassing a few more buildings. Hazel frowned and faced away from the church, towards the road, and stepped up towards it. She didn't bother to look down at the road before stepping up onto it. Ice met the bottom of her shoe, and before she could finish the step she began to make up onto the road, she was flung onto her back for the second time. 


	3. Chapter Three

Ring.  
  
"Portland Missing Per-"  
  
"My daughter is missing."  
  
"What's her name, ma'am?"  
  
"Hazel Halliwell."  
  
That's why the voice sounded so familiar. It was her second time calling. "Ma'am, we've already got a report on her-"  
  
Dial tone. Jacob Wells slammed the phone down and dug into the pocket on the inside of his jacket for his Marlboros. "Dammit," he muttered. "Dammit. Dammit." Aggravated, he burned his finger in the process of flicking on his lighter. "Shit," he howled.  
  
"Watch the language, would you?"  
  
Jacob glared at the man who stood in the doorway. "Put yourself in my position and try that," he snapped. "Who are you and what do you want?"  
  
"I'm looking for Officer Gentry."  
  
"You passed his office. It's up that hall and the second room to the left." The man turned to go. "Who are you?"  
  
The man glanced at Jacob over his shoulder. "Denver Elwood. The detective you guys wanted."  
  
When Denver Elwood left the room, Jacob snorted and successfully lit his Marlboro. "We didn't want you," he muttered. "You guys wanted to come down here."  
  
Denver Elwood couldn't clearly remember the last time he'd been in the Portland Police Department. He knew that it'd been a very long time ago and that he was nearly fired, but the layout was something he wasn't used to, and he was sure that he'd been used to it when he worked here. The room occupied by the snappy Jacob Wells was the head office, but that was once upon a time.  
  
"Second room on the left..."  
  
He knocked politely.  
  
"Who is it?"  
  
"Detective Denver El-"  
  
The door opened before he could finish speaking. "Denver Elwood, get in here."  
  
Jon Gentry. He knew that face.  
  
"What's been taking you so long?"  
  
"Traffic." He flashed a small grin and removed his sunglasses. "That snow causes a few too many wrecks."  
  
"Understandable. Sit Down. Please," he added quickly, remembering that Denver Elwood was no longer his employee.  
  
Denver sat across the desk from Gentry, glancing to his right when he noticed the woman seated adjacent to him. She smiled shortly, then stared at the floor.  
  
"I'm glad you showed up, Denver. I want you to take one of our officers with you."  
  
"Oh." Denver raised his eyebrows. "Really."  
  
"Really."  
  
"Well...if they won't get in the way...I guess...that's fine."  
  
"This is Officer Jessie Boyle."  
  
Denver glanced at her again and offered, almost timidly, to shake her hand. She took his hand, and Gentry almost laughed at the halfhearted shake the two shared. Denver glared at Gentry, but his eyes smiled. Jessie's face reddened and she withdrew her hand quickly. Denver stood quickly, startling both Gentry and Jessie.  
  
"Well, if it's all right, I'd like to get moving now."  
  
"How long do you think we'll be out?" Jessie asked.  
  
"Most of the day, but not out overnight. You don't need to bring anything. I suppose I can cover meals." He shook hands with Gentry. "Good to see you again, Jon."  
  
"You too, Denver. Take care of yourself. And Jessie, too. Not that I think she'll need it."  
  
Jessie smiled a little. "Goodbye, Mr. Gentry." She shook his hand over the desk and left the room after Denver.  
  
"Did you work for him once?" Jessie asked as she trailed after Denver down the hall.  
  
"Yeah," he replied. "For a long time. Then I became a detective."  
  
"Whenever I hear the word detective, I always think of Sherlock Holmes, no matter how many times I've watched Law & Order and CSI."  
  
"I'm not the only cop that watches those shows?" He looked at her over his shoulder, smiling.  
  
Jessie grinned. "I love them. I always have, even in college."  
  
*** ***  
  
While the snow boots kept her feet warm and dry, they lacked any sort of traction, as Hazel learned on her third fall after she'd made it up onto the street. Someone, somewhere, ('Most likely that girl,' Hazel thought,) had to be laughing at her. When she finally found her footing on the street, she pulled out the map, turned away from the building she'd left, and held the map in front of her the way she was facing.  
  
'Silent Hill is west of here...I'm facing south...turn right.'  
  
She blinked.  
  
'No...left...Then I'm going east...right? I need to go west...turn right. Right.'  
  
She spun on her heel to the right and caught her balance before she tumbled onto the road again. Gathering her bearings, she decided on walking the side of the road, tucked her hands into the pockets of her coat, and began to walk.  
  
'This area looked kind of empty on the train, but I never imagined it'd look so deserted.'  
  
She passed gas stations and convenient stores on the road, but each one was consecutively emptier and in worse stages of decay. With the fourth decrepit building she passed, she suddenly remembered the box in her pocket and stopped walking to dig it out.  
  
A blank box, wrapped in brown meat packaging paper and tied with twine. 'Looks more like it was self-wrapped and dropped off.' She tugged a loose end of the twine and stuffed the rope and paper into her pocket. The box itself was sealed with masking tape that gave way easily to her nails. She slipped apart the four panels of the box that sealed off the contents and sighed with relief at the first two objects in the box.  
  
Two boxes of cigarettes. Her favorites ones, at that. 'Someone knows how to give a gift.' She tucked them and the lighter that followed into her pocket.  
  
A self-defense knife. Hazel raised an eyebrow at the small blade, then stuffed it into another pocket. "Okay," she murmured.  
  
A key. The cigarettes and lighter moved to the inside pocket of her coat and the key into their previous abode. Left now was a golden chain and a small baggy of charms for a bracelet. Hazel examined the charms in her hand-two childish, distorted human figures and three adult ones, a boy and girl, the girl set with false, lime green gemstones and the boy with blue ones, then a woman, red, and two men, both deep green. Hazel chuckled, raising little clouds at her lips, and strung the charms onto the chain that they shared the bag with. "I'm guessing you want me to wear this," she muttered, linking it around her neck.  
  
Finally, only a letter was left. Hazel pried it gently from the bottom of the box and unfolded it gingerly.  
  
Hazel,  
  
It's been thirteen years since many bad things have happened, but I'm ready to make amends now. I'm waiting for you in Silent Hill if you'll come to find me. There is revenge to be served and justice to be made, but nothing will happen until you find me in Silent Hill.  
  
I'm on the third floor of the building, but you should know that by now. But I have to keep moving, so if you don't find me in time, I'll have moved. I can't tell you just where I am, because Tom will find me then. Maybe I can leave you clues, but if Tom finds me first, we're both dead.  
  
Look out for yourself, Hazel. If you die, then I'll never get out of here. If I never get out of here, who knows what will happen. You have many enemies and few allies.  
  
The letter ended. Hazel reread the front page and flipped it over. Her aggravation when the letter didn't continue boiled.  
  
"Where's the rest of the letter?" she whispered, tearing open the other end of the box and making sure there wasn't another piece of the letter she'd forgotten. As the second piece of paper left the box, her heart soared at the hope there'd be another piece of the letter, but it was only a map almost identical to the cloth one stuffed in her pocket. Paper, marked in multiple places with black and red ink. In the bottom right corner of the map were scribbled words.  
  
'I'm still _____________________ter she's talking about really mean______r all, if she is supposed ____________fe of the g______________and why we haven't found her and raisedher____________environment she'll_____________________...'  
  
Too many smudges of ink to be eligible...The note ended in a long smear. The only visible words towards the bottom of the notes were "fail Samael" and "White Claudia."  
  
White Claudia.  
  
It sounded too familiar to be a coincidence.  
  
Hazel had been aggravated when the letter was cut off, but her aggravation at a marked-up map and a note that was too smudged to read didn't help at all. The contents of the box, save for the cigarettes and knife, returned to the box, as well as the twine and paper, and she shoved it back into the pocket.  
  
"This is bull," she muttered. "I don't even have a brother. I'm really starting to regret leaving that church thing."  
  
Her head was beginning to hurt again. She began to reach for a cigarette, then thought better of it and dumped two painkillers from the bag into her hand and downed them. The next thing to her lips was a familiar cigarette.  
  
'Make it last,' she mused. 'Those freaks back there won't let you in. You've got some walking to do.'  
  
*** ***  
  
Neither Denver or Jessie was very up for talking, and the slow ride down the iced roads was tensely quiet save for the random music blaring on the radio. Jessie, after gaining Denver's permission, fiddled with the dial occasionally until she found a song that held her attention for a while, but when the song ended, she moved to another station. It didn't take very long for the stations to all meld together into a great mass of white noise.  
  
"I guess the reception out here kind of sucks," she muttered.  
  
"Yeah. Hasn't changed since the last time I was out here."  
  
"When was that?"  
  
"My first year as a detective. About four years ago. Missing Person's Case. I've had enough of those since September to last me a damn lifetime."  
  
"I know what you mean," Jessie murmured. "Though I imagine you've heard about the calls we've been getting."  
  
"How many so far?"  
  
"Thirteen."  
  
"Thirteen. Same here. That's just the number of the hour, isn't it?"  
  
"More like the number of the month. Or two months." She laughed softly with her breath, bringing a small cloud of fog to life. "So...what all is down in this direction?"  
  
"Silent Hill."  
  
"Silent Hill? I've heard of that place. There was a huge drug bust there a while back."  
  
"That and they get a lot of complains about vandalism. It's an almost empty town. The population is less than ten people."  
  
"Wow," Jessie murmured, staring ahead. "What's it like?"  
  
"It's different," Denver murmured. "To put it lightly. It's been deserted for a while. I'm not sure how long. It's a ghost town, officially, but some people still live there. We advise against it, but we can't stop them."  
  
"I almost got to be a part of the drug bust," Jessie mused.  
  
"Almost?"  
  
"Yeah. I was new at the time and Gentry wanted only the vets on it if we got anyone on it at all."  
  
"Did you get anyone on it?"  
  
"Yeah, but he died."  
  
"Blake?"  
  
"Hm?"  
  
"It was Blake Widener, wasn't it?" Denver said, meeting her gaze in the mirror.  
  
"Yeah," Jessie said quietly. "I didn't know him very well, but people liked him. He was a nice guy."  
  
"He was. He and I were friends for some time."  
  
"I'm sorry you had to lose him."  
  
"It's all right. We had a bit of a falling out after I became a detective. I hadn't talked to him for a while. Sometimes it feels like we're still just not talking to each other."  
  
'Change the subject,' Jessie thought. 'He's obviously not comfortable with it. You'll only make things worse by forcing him to talk about it.'  
  
"You were saying that we're most likely heading to Silent Hill," Jessie said. "Why?"  
  
"I have a feeling that the town has something to do with it."  
  
"Any ideas? Just a hunch?"  
  
"This town has a big history of cult business."  
  
Jessie began to yawn, then choked on air. "Cult?" she breathed. Denver patted her back.  
  
"You all right?"  
  
"Yeah. Sorry." She brushed her straight, sandy hair off her forehead and tucked it behind her ears. "Got something caught at the back of my throat."  
  
"Do you need water?"  
  
"No thanks. I'll be fine. You said something about a cult?"  
  
"Yeah. I was saying that Silent Hill has a bad history of involvement with cults. You know that whole White Claudia business?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"That started because of a cult in Silent Hill called 'The Order' or something like that. They caused a bunch of hell with the White Claudia. When we got a hold of a few members of that thing, they rambled on about how it would allow them to control the minds of people. They were trying to take over the world, or something along those lines."  
  
"Sounds familiar," Jessie scoffed. "Typical cult business."  
  
"Can't expect much else. Those people are dangerous, though. They've killed too many people. They're serious about making sacrifices and the destruction of all those who oppose and all the etceteras."  
  
"Yeah," Jessie murmured. "They seem to be. I thought they disbanded with the last drug bust."  
  
"I highly doubt it. They may have lost most of their backup and members, but I have a feeling that a few loyals are still together, keeping the spirit alive. It wouldn't be above them."  
  
Jessie smiled a little. "You really don't like them."  
  
"I despise them." Denver's face hardened.  
  
"I lost my mother to them," Jessie admitted. Denver glanced at her, then back to the road. "She went to Silent Hill for a vacation about...eleven or twelve years ago. Never came back. Some time after that I drove down with my dad to find her, and when we stopped at a gas station, there was a group of weird looking people hanging around the area. They knew who we were...they came up to us, gave us a package from my mom, and wouldn't let us drive any further. When we opened the parcel, it was a few things from my mom...her jewelry, photos of her and of us, and a letter, saying that she had joined the cult and this was the last time she'd be able to communicate with us unless we joined the cult as well."  
  
Denver didn't reply. He kept his gaze on the road ahead of him. Finally, after long, tense moments of silence, he spoke. "I've lost many friends to this cult," he said quietly. "I know how you're feeling, Jessie."  
  
Jessie looked down at her legs and laced her fingers together. "I'd like to see my mother again."  
  
"I can't help you very much with that," Denver said. "But I'll try."  
  
Jessie would have thanked him, but the static on Denver's radio began to swell in volume. Jessie reached for the volume dial to turn it down before it grew unbearable, but no matter how she turned it, it continued to crescendo to the unbearable volume Jessie had attempted to dodge.  
  
*** ***  
  
Hazel's headache returned of a sudden with a doubled force that made her groan and collapse to her knees in the snow. She couldn't reach the painkillers in time, and she suddenly recognized the white noise of the previous hours blaring in her mind like someone had set a radio in her brain to full volume on a station that didn't exist.  
  
"What the hell happened?"  
  
"I don't know, it won't go down."  
  
Hazel groaned, clutching her head and burying her face in her arms.  
  
"Do you hear that?"  
  
"Hear what?"  
  
"Shh..."  
  
It faded, almost as quickly as it had come over her. Hazel rose gingerly, one hand over her ear as her head ached dully. "Ow," she muttered.  
  
"Make them last," the girl had told her.  
  
"Yeah, well, I bet her brain didn't spontaneously explode," Hazel muttered as she stuffed a third painkiller into her mouth, followed by a cigarette to her lips. She stopped herself before lighting it and stuffed it back into the pack. "Bad Hazel," she muttered to herself. "No cigarette."  
  
*** ***  
  
The moment the radio returned to her control, Jessie quickly shut it off. "Did you hear that?"  
  
"I heard someone crying," Denver murmured.  
  
"Crying? I heard some groaning...like they were in pain."  
  
"Which one of us is going insane?" Denver managed a small smile.  
  
Jessie shrugged back into the chair and tucked her hands into her pockets. "I've heard rumors about Silent Hill before."  
  
"There's a lot of them. Why didn't you tell me before?"  
  
"You'd laugh at me."  
  
"Laugh? No. Tell me what you've heard."  
  
"Typical rumors. It's hell on earth. If you go there, it'll swallow you whole. Whoever goes there doesn't come back."  
  
"I wouldn't say they don't come back. I mean...we haven't lost many people to Silent Hill. But they don't always come back to us completely intact. Maybe they're wounded, and they're too scared to tell us what happened. Maybe they come back as utter nut cases. But that was all back when the cult was in order and we didn't know what to do with them, though."  
  
"There's not much to worry about now?"  
  
"I wouldn't have let you come if I was that worried about your safety."  
  
Jessie frowned. 'Makes sense.'  
  
"Worried about it?" Denver asked.  
  
"No," Jessie said shortly. Denver only smiled.  
  
"Me too," he said. "It's a freaky place. All I can tell you is to watch my back and I'll watch yours."  
  
"I'll keep that in mind." Jessie cupped her face in her gloved hands to warm her cheeks. "Detective Elwood-"  
  
"Hey. What's with this "Detective Elwood' business? My name's Denver."  
  
"Sorry. Denver?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"What happened to Silent Hill?"  
  
He watched the road thoughtfully. "Good question. I'm not too keen on the history. There's a historical society somewhere along the outskirts of the town, though. I'm sure they'll have things for you to look at there."  
  
After his statement, there was another bout of untimely silence, tense and aggravating but satisfying the way that both Jessie and Denver knew the other one was looking for conversation as well. Jessie's eyes flicked up from the floor, and she began to speak until she noticed something blocking the road up ahead.  
  
"Denver-"  
  
"Yeah...I see it."  
  
Cows, blocking the middle of the road. Jessie groaned, and Denver applied a slight pressure to the brakes.  
  
"Lucky we spotted it so early," Denver muttered. "If we'd hit them, they'dve done more damage to the car than I would've done to them."  
  
The car slowed to a gentle stop measured meters from the herd of cows, and Denver guided it carefully to the side of the road, out of the way of any cars unfortunate enough to be travelling his same road. A sudden jolt that knocked Jessie from her seat informed the both of them that something had gone wrong.  
  
"You're off the road," Jessie said. "I think."  
  
"Shit," Denver cursed. He turned the keys in the ignition, tugged them out, dropped them into his pocket, and attempted to open his door.  
  
"Snow bank," Jessie murmured.  
  
"Gorgeous. You must be able to tell I'm not used to driving in snow."  
  
"Yeah. I can tell. You did pretty good on the road, though." She tried her own door, but it held against the snow. "Are the back ones jammed?"  
  
"Might as well find out." He undid the safety belt impatiently. The clack of the metal belt against the cold glass window made Jessie wince, but Denver ignored it, turned in his chair, reached into the back seat, and tried the door behind him. Jessie followed his suite.  
  
"Negative," Denver said.  
  
"Same here. Guess we're crawling out the windows."  
  
Denver looked at his window, then at Jessie. "We'd have to cut half the door away for me to get out of this."  
  
Jessie flashed a grin at him, her first that Denver could remember. "Nah." She twirled the window bar till it opened completely, but it jammed halfway down. "I agree completely."  
  
Denver rubbed his chin. "I guess this is my fault for getting us stuck in the snow bank."  
  
"Putting a blame on someone won't solve anything. How new is this car?"  
  
"How new does it look?"  
  
"Sorry...that was a redundant question. Better question-how much do you love this car and how much would it hurt to get new windows?"  
  
"What are you suggesting?"  
  
Jessie removed a rolled up beret from her jacket pocket and pulled it over her straight hair. "Do any of these windows roll down completely?"  
  
"No. Explains why I made the reference to cutting away half of the car door."  
  
"Can we break the windows?"  
  
Denver turned his head from the window and looked at her oddly. "Are you kidding?"  
  
"I'm being perfectly serious. You don't have any shovels or anything in here with you, so there's no way we can move the snow through the window; our arms aren't long enough. The only way we'll get out is by breaking the windows."  
  
"You're insane."  
  
"Possibly." She shivered from the cold. "How far away is Silent Hill?"  
  
"Well...we've been moving walking or jogging distance down this road for about two hours, right?"  
  
"Right."  
  
"I'd say not even thirty minutes."  
  
"Good. We can walk from here."  
  
"The car will be filled with snow when we get back."  
  
"We can't get the car out of the snow bank now, and the snow won't let up for a long time. It's either go do what we set out to do or sit here and wait for some...two odd hours to get someone back to us."  
  
"We can at least call," Denver suggested, and reached for the com-radio.  
  
"Can we connect out here?"  
  
Fuzz from the radio filled their ears.  
  
"No," Denver said dryly.  
  
"Maybe our phones will have some reception out here."  
  
"Doubt it."  
  
Jessie shifted on the car seat to remove the gray phone from her back pocket. She flipped it open. "It's not even on." She tapped the rubbery power button that topped the phone with her thumbnail. "It won't turn on."  
  
"Dead battery?"  
  
"I just charged it last night," Jessie murmured, shifting again to slip the phone back into her hind pocket. Denver removed his own phone from the front pocket of the jacket.  
  
"Mine's on...the lights are on...but there's nothing on the screen." He tapped the power button. "It won't turn off."  
  
"Wonderful. I still say we break the windows and get out of here."  
  
"I'd have to agree now that I see out situation. It's gonna be damn cold when we get back."  
  
"It's fine with me," Jessie said, shrugging. "What should we break the windows with?"  
  
"Gun," Denver said simply.  
  
((AN: Just recently fixed a very stupid mistake in here. Hopefully you caught it, but then again, hopefully you didn't. I'm stupid, just leave me alone.)) 


	4. Chapter Four

When Hazel entered the restroom, the farthest stall in the room featured a closed door and a sobbing voice. No legs were visible beneath the stall. Hazel figured the crier had drawn her legs up on the toilet. She exhaled through her nose, frowning somewhat, and moved into the stall farthest from the crying one.  
  
Hazel pulled the top seat of the toilet down and settled on it, crossing her legs. Even if she had felt a need to relieve herself (and she didn't, surprising herself mildly), she would have passed on the chance.   
  
Public restrooms-high on the list of things that made her go, "Bleh." Especially dirty ones, such as the one she occupied now.  
  
The first cigarette to her lips was cool to the touch at first, but it warmed quickly to the fire of the lighter. "Menthol," her lungs seemed to sigh. "Tar. Sticky, oozing tar." She grinned to herself and took a deep drag. "Slow, sweet, boxed death," she murmured. "Packaged up very attractively. Cigarette. Cigar-ette. Little cigar. But cigars suck." She held the cigarette up to her eye and scrutinized it. "But you, my friend, do not suck. If you were a man, I'd marry you. If you were a woman...I'd get a civil union with you or go to Nevada and marry you."  
  
The door clattered open, and a blast of cold air caught Hazel by surprise. The embers in the butt of the cigarette snuffed out quickly on the cold concrete floor where it now lay. "Well, fuck," Hazel murmured under her breath. "Goddamn one night stands never got me anywhere. Close the door, would you?" Hazel called. When there was no reply, she rose and left the dirty stall tattooed with a surfeit of graffiti.  
  
"No? Okay, I'll close the door."  
  
Hazel blinked, stopping outside the stall and crossing her arms over her chest. The door seemed pinned against the wall, and the restroom was empty. Hazel took slow steps toward the door, then tugged on the handle, but the door wouldn't budge. She tugged harder on the handle, her teeth beginning to chatter with the cold.  
  
"Come on," she growled through gritted teeth. "Just close...keep the cold out for a few minutes..."  
  
The handle flew out of her grasp and the door slammed shut. Hazel jumped with her shock at the door slamming shut on its own, then removed the hat on her head and tucked it into her pocket. "All right, then," she muttered. "I guess 'minutes' is the magic word. Close any door."  
  
She tried the handle and, much to her assumptions, the door wouldn't open.  
  
"Shi-i-it," she whined. 'Not fair.' She tugged on the handle again, laying her foot flat on the wall by the door to brace herself as she tugged on the door, but it stubbornly refuse to give. Hazel stumbled back, crashing into the wall behind her.   
  
"Ow." She rubbed her backside, still smarting from slamming into the benches on the train too many times, then straightened and began formulating her escape plan.  
  
And then, quite suddenly, the bathroom grew much colder than it had been earlier. Hazel hugged her arms to her chest and shifted, walking in place to warm her legs. 'I hope you feel stupid for choosing the short skirt.'  
  
"I do," she muttered, a brief examination of the ceiling revealed no windows   
  
'The one time a window would've been helpful.' She rubbed her eyes, met her own tired gaze in the mirror, and gawked.  
  
The bathroom, though it had been in somewhat of a state of deterioration, was utterly destroyed, it seemed. Walls were grimy, black and red with rust and occasional smears that looked too slick to be rust (Hazel didn't try to imagine what it was). Mirrors were shattered, shards scattered at her feet. Stalls lay in the same state of deterioration as the walls, if they were even still standing. The sinks had disappeared, replaced by old, rusting pumps, and the very ground was a trembling, grating sheet of grill beneath her feet, the only thing saving her from an endless fall into a black, rumbling pit.  
  
Hazel shivered and hugged her arms to the chest, taking in the new scenery timidly, turning carefully, not trusting the iron grating beneath her feet. The last stall stood, the door still taught on its hinges and closed, still somewhat foreboding, still emitting sobs. She sucked in a breath of cold, damp air, and took careful, deliberated treads to the door, knocked softly, and jumped as the door swung open to reveal an empty stall, splattered and painted with thick, red blood.   
  
Hazel drew her trembling fingers gently along the stall wall to her right and held the blood-smeared fingers close to her face, inspecting the cold, rusty red liquid on her fingers, then stepped back from the stall, and dashed for the door. The handle tugged out of the rotting wood at her mere touch, but the door loosened from its hinges and collapsed as her weight slammed against the body of the door.  
  
There was nothing beyond the door. Hazel's arms flailed and clutched for anything to hold, but only met snow. She blinked, took in the snowy ground around her, and raised her head.  
  
Back outside the bathroom again. Hazel pushed herself up and stood shakily, legs trembling, leaning against the brick wall behind her for support. "What the hell," she muttered.  
  
'Did they put something in the painkillers?"  
  
Gingerly, she took a tentative step, but her legs wobbled and made it clear they weren't ready to walk yet. She collapsed to her knees in the cold snow and held herself there till she felt brave enough to rise. When she did, she tugged a cigarette from the cartons in her pocket, put it to her lips, and lit it.  
  
'Probably put something in the Slims, too.'  
  
A blue ghost of smoke hissed past her lips. She dropped the cigarette, and ground it into the snow. 'Bad habit anyway,' she thought, then moved to her right, keep a steady hand on the fence to hold her upright as she half-walked, half-slid down the sidewalk towards the barricade blocking the road. To her right, an old, gray lake rocked against dim sand, reminding Hazel of an old lady in a rocking chair.  
  
'WE COME' proclaimed the red lettering stretching the highest expanse of the barricade.  
  
At the foot of the grating that stretched from the road to the top of the barricade, the 'L' lay alone, propped up. Beside "WE COME" was one road sign, red, reading "Paleville National Park, 10 miles." At her feet lay the sign that had once rested beside the red one, smeared with red and black graffiti to the point of being obscure.  
  
"IT SHOULDN'T HAVE GONE THIS FAR"  
  
Hazel knelt carefully and scratched at one of the loose flakes of paint. Written on the thick red and black letters in a fine point Sharpie was a random series of words.  
  
"angry wrath paper simple wrench fairy pen blade sex school career"  
  
She bit back a wry laugh. "Sex, school, career," she echoed, then rose and left the barricade behind. There was no way to get through it, and, according to the map, a small road curved around and led into the town.  
  
Down a set of icy steps and onto a narrow, snowed-over path formed by a small flat in the slopes that led from the trees down to the dull lake. Hazel followed the randomly curving trail, hesitating in her steps as she came across a small gazebo that housed a well to her right. Hazel left the track for a moment and glanced down into the dirty, brown water, catching her frazzled reflection.  
  
'Stop and think.'  
  
'What happened back in that bathroom?'  
  
She pulled the hat off her head and tucked it into her pocket. It was just irritating her ears, anyway.  
  
'And the last stall...'  
  
She raked a hand through her hair and smoothed it.  
  
'Keep going.'  
  
A sudden gust of harsh wind pushed her on down the path till she reached a pair of wrought iron gates, painted black and peeling. Aging and rusting, they could barely cling to the leaning poles that supported them. One gate squealed faintly in protest as she pushed it open, and she slipped between the two gates, down the aisle formed by two crumbling stone walls, carefully dodging thick chunks of rock that scattered the floor, fallen from the walls. The hair on the back of her neck pricked and began to strand straight up, pressing against the fabric of the jacket. The fog grew thicker, and she kept walking, no matter how badly she wanted to turn around and run back to wherever she'd come from. No, she was too close now, it was too late to turn back.  
  
Something waited for her there, and she was going to answer its call.  
  
The aisle spilled into a serene, open field, blanketed with white. Hazel's legs ceased to walk, and she rested, shivering in ankle-deep snow.  
  
It seemed empty, save for the dark, gothic-European-esque building that stood ominous and solitary among the white snow. Hazel took a step and began to walk toward the building, but her knee connected with something hard, and she recognized a tombstone, thick with snow like icing on a cake.  
  
She stepped gingerly around it, patting it gently in a sort of apology, and took slower, more careful strides to the building. When she reached it, she hesitated.  
  
'A family crypt?'  
  
She brushed the layers of snow from the door at her level, then reached higher and cleaned off a cold, silvery plate.  
  
'Benton.'  
  
She pulled out the map and smoothed it out against the door. 'So this is a cemetery.' She drew her finger gently across the little gray spot that sprouted from a thin path. And Silent Hill is down there.' She jabbed her finger against the area where the road she was to next follow met the town, and the door beneath her hands swung open easily, colliding hard with the wall behind it and raising a ghost of dust.  
  
Hazel was stunned for a second, then quickly gathered the map and tucked it into her pocket. She began to quickly close the door, but a glint of something caught her eye.  
  
'Don't go in. You've seen horror movies, you know how this goes. It's gonna be a knife, and some psycho in there is gonna grab it, rape you, kill you, and eat you. God knows in what order.'  
  
The boards creaked beneath her feet, only mounting the tension that whipped in the air around her. She took another step towards the glinting metal, reached out gingerly, and felt the jagged edges of a key in her fingers. She lifted it and held it to her face for examining. 'Benton,' it read, just like the sign on the crypt. Hazel looked down at the key-shaped lack of dust on the wooden coffin.  
  
'Wonder who the Bentons are.'  
  
She turned and left the crypt quickly, shutting the door behind her. The key, however, did not fit the lock when she attempted to lock the door behind her. Hazel dropped it into her pocket and stepped back.  
  
'The map said the exit would be north...so that'd be behind this.'  
  
She sidestepped the building and glanced behind it, noticing another set of dilapidated gates. She stopped walking towards them when she heard the strained sneeze inside the building behind her. Inside her chest, her heart seemed to skip a beat, then caught itself and raced. For a moment, her stomach dropped, and she glanced over her shoulder.  
  
'Hearing things.'  
  
She took a step back and turned.  
  
'Dammit, Hazel, don't go in there.'  
  
'Do you ever really listen to yourself?'  
  
She pushed the door open tentatively with her fingertips and took a step in, leaning forward. "Hello?" she breathed, then realized she hadn't even heard her own voice. "Hello?" she said again, louder this time, and her voice wavered and cracked.  
  
"Huh?" The voice was sharp. Hazel jumped, then stepped back quickly as a shuffling sound filled the air. From the darkness, the outline of a face, framed in thick black ringlets, rose, feral green eyes glinting like precious stones from the sparse light allotted from outside.  
  
"Who are you?" Hazel stammered. Her voice was failing her.  
  
The person raced toward her, and she yelped, jumping back outside into the snow. She reached into her pockets, searching for anything to defend herself, and her fingers fell on the knife. She held out her hand and began to flick out the blade, but a white hand seized her wrist and dragged her into the crypt before she could release the blade.  
  
"Hazel," a soft, male voice was muttering. The blade was tugged from her grasp and tossed away, and soon, gentle fingers were feeling her face and hair hurriedly.  
  
"Stop," Hazel snapped, batting at the hands. "Stop, stop, stop!" She found the face in front of her and her fist connected hard with the jaw. The body fell away from her and she scrambled up to her feet. "Just knock it the fuck off! Jesus!"  
  
There was a slow silence, then the soft voice spoke again. "No...I guess you wouldn't recognize me, would you?"  
  
"I can't even see you. What makes you think I would recognize you?"  
  
"Hm."  
  
"Who are you?"  
  
"Hazel?"  
  
"I'm Hazel. Who are you?"  
  
"It's not important."  
  
"It's damn important. You just molested my face."  
  
A chuckle. "My apologies. I thought you would recognize me."  
  
"Sorry...I have no idea who you are."  
  
"It would seem so."  
  
"...Who are you?"  
  
"My name isn't important."  
  
"What are you doing here?"  
  
"I should ask you the same question." The voice seemed much softer.  
  
"I didn't have much of a choice," Hazel muttered, shrugging. "That's all I can say, really."  
  
"I didn't have much of a choice, either. I was drawn here, much the same as you."  
  
"I wouldn't say I was "drawn" here..." Hazel touched her chin with a fingertip.  
  
"Really?"  
  
The man stood. He was hardly taller than she, slim, but with somewhat of a build. Hazel didn't know what to make of him.  
  
"Really," she murmured.  
  
"So you just ended up here?"  
  
"I came here of my own accord. I was in an accident. I woke up in a church or something, and they said I would find all my answers here."  
  
"Why aren't you going home, then?"  
  
Hazel hesitated. "I don't know where that is."  
  
"Do you not have parents?'  
  
"I do, but...um...I lost all my memory when I was nineteen, so I don't know where they are."  
  
"I'm sorry."  
  
Hazel shrugged. "It's depressing, but it's also somewhat...releasing. I don't have much to worry about anymore."  
  
The man stepped into the shaft of gray light that spilled in from the doorway. His features were sharp, yet infinitely soft, just as his words were.  
  
'Walking paradox.'  
  
They weren't her thoughts.  
  
'He's as lost as I am,' she mused, 'and then again he seems as clueless as I am.'  
  
"Last," he said. Hazel, who had been lost in her own contemplation, gave a start.  
  
"Sorry?"  
  
"Last," he said. "It's my name."  
  
"Last," Hazel echoed. 'Weird.' She kept the latter thought to herself. "Who are you...or...well..."  
  
"I know what you mean."  
  
Hazel nodded slightly.  
  
"And my answer is that I don't know. I'd be horribly disappointed if I did, however, for in this position, I hold a unique role."  
  
"Hm?"  
  
"I'm sitting alone."  
  
"I don't think I follow you."  
  
"I didn't expect you to."  
  
Hazel bit her lip and glanced at the floor. "Can I have that knife back?"  
  
He shifted, then kicked, and the little knife slid across the floor and collided with her feet. The blade was drawn. Hazel knelt to pick it up, then tucked it into one of her pockets again.  
  
"So...what's so special about Silent Hill?"  
  
"There are many things," Last said. "But that you will find out in time, among other things."  
  
Hazel raised her eyebrows and frowned. "Oh."  
  
"You should be going."  
  
"Is it dangerous?"  
  
"Depends on how you define dangerous."  
  
"Do I need to be armed, at least?"  
  
"I would. Just to be safe."  
  
Hazel nodded. "Goodbye, Last." She turned, but at her first step, he was already at her back, a hand curled around her arm and a lock of her hair tangled in his fingers.  
  
"Leaving so soon?" His voice nearly sounded pleading.  
  
"I don't have all day." His warm, sweet breath on the back of her neck made her shiver in a way she wished she wouldn't. She tugged out of his grasp and shuffled to the other end of the house quickly. In the doorway, Last twirled the knife between his fingers and flicked out the blade. It pricked the end of his long, white finger.  
  
"You've got a lifetime, kid," he muttered. 


	5. Chapter Five

"I thought you said we weren't far from this place," Jessie muttered through gritted teeth, chattering and shivering from the cold.  
  
"You said that about a mile back on the road."  
  
"No kidding. I'd forgotten already."  
  
Denver shielded his eyes from the onslaught of snow that leapt at him with a sudden gust of wind. "I could have sworn it was," he muttered. "I guess I was wrong."  
  
"You just guess?"  
  
"Look." He stepped up behind her and pointed over her shoulder. Beyond the thick fog and sheets of snow, a gray shape was rising.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"Don't know. Might as well go see."  
  
A parking lot and aging building apparated from the mist. Jessie was more vigilant about exploring than Denver, who pushed against the wind and into the parking lot first.  
  
"What is it?" Jessie called.  
  
"Historical Society."  
  
"What?"  
  
"The Silent Hill Historical Society."  
  
"Is it open?"  
  
Denver looked at her oddly. "Didn't you know?"  
  
"Know what?"  
  
"This place is abandoned. This whole city, both districts of it. It's been that way for a little while."  
  
"Oh." Jessie held her hair out of her face and examined the building before her. "So...would we be breaking and entering?"  
  
"Possibly."  
  
Jessie raised her eyebrows at him, but he didn't return the gesture, and tried the door to the building.  
  
A dirt road, laid in on both sides by ranches and houses on large plots of land. The further down the road she walked, the smokier everything seemed to become. By now, the clouds above her were so thick it surprised her that the clouds hadn't grown sick of teasing her with snow and just dumped buckets of rain onto her head.  
  
The thick silence nipping at her heels kept her stumbling along the uneven road at a rock pace, glancing over her shoulder too often and then gazing around, wishing she could run across another human presence. But the world around her ignored her silent pleas, and the road sloped upward, forcing Hazel to trudge on, alone, up the snowy hill.  
  
Her throat was closing. Hazel stopped and leaned against the fence, catching her breath, wishing she could hold her heart in place to keep it from hammering so.  
  
'Need to get out more.'  
  
She examined the hill she'd just conquered, and her face fell. 'Very disappointing.' She rose from the fence and stumbled the rest of the lengthy distance upwards, and stopped again to rest when she reached the small cement building that crowned it.  
  
The hill seemed awfully short when she looked down it again. She laughed at herself, and her throat burned. 'There're probably people worse off than me who could pull that off without breaking a sweat...'  
  
She wiped the small sheen of perspiration from her forehead and upper lip, then turned her head and inspected the short hallway that lay ahead of her. Papers, mostly newspapers, were strewn around the floor and plastered to the cold, wet walls. Hazel stepped into the hallway and put a hand against the wall for balance, but quickly drew it away again when she realized how cold the wall was. Wet newspaper ripped from its source and stuck to her fingers.  
  
As she began to wipe the paper off her fingers and onto the wall, she examined the paper.  
  
'Jacob Halliwell was hospitalized early Sunday morning for nearly fatal injuries received during a mysterious attack Saturday evening. Police suspect a crime of passion spurred by the attempted murder of Thomas Hawk in early 1994, but no suspects have yet been caught and questioned.'  
  
There was "More on ATTACK on 13A," but page 13A didn't seem to exist in this hallway. A short, further examination revealed that all the papers scattered around the hall were the same paper.  
  
"Huh." Hazel skimmed the rest of the articles, but nothing else really caught her attention. She continued down the hallway, pushing open the gate that blocked her way.  
  
"The town's just down here. I swear."  
  
Though Denver couldn't see her, he knew Jessie was pouting behind him. 'Or something like that,' he thought.  
  
"I think you owe me for this."  
  
"What do I owe you, then?"  
  
Jessie shrugged, then remembered she couldn't see him. "I don't know. Tell me what all you know about this town?"  
  
"I told you already, I don't know anything about it."  
  
"I'm not stupid. You've got to know more than just that."  
  
He frowned thoughtfully. "Maybe. It's dodgy, though. I don't even know if it's true."  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"A little bit of history."  
  
"Tell me anyway." She caught up with him quickly, her interest piqued.  
  
"It's been a while since I read about it," he began, "but I'll try to tell you what I remember. I don't know how the town got started...probably a settlement...but during a war...the Civil War, I think, a prisoner camp was built here, and a huge number of executions took place, mostly hangings, firelines, and decapitation. There was plenty of bloodshed, though, and the swamps that used to surround this area turned red from the blood that was washed into them. The hospital in this southern area was built to house victims of a plague that struck the area. It started out as a tiny house, then grew into a pretty large hospital. I've told you a little bit about all the drug business and cult things that went on here."  
  
Jessie nodded.  
  
"The town used to be a tourist trap...people would come here just to visit, and that cult would get them hooked on White Claudia. It was one hell of a drug. It drove people insane. Tourists who visited here disappeared. Some time ago, a boat full of tourists went out onto Toluca Lake and never came back. No one knows what happened to it."  
  
Jessie nodded again. "Spooky," she murmured.  
  
"To put it lightly. Scary place. Those aren't the only strange things that have happened here, but I can't mention any more."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"That's all I know about."  
  
The rest of the journey went in silence till they reached the gas station.  
  
If the road weren't iced over, Hazel imagined she'd have a much easier time with the slope that descended slowly down into fog. Hazel stopped at the end of the stone hallway, examining the path that lay before her. Beyond the drop at the curb and the end of the road as it curled around the hillside like smoke, she could see nothing, just the thick gray fog.  
  
'This is Purgatory, and now you're going down into hell.'  
  
It made her laugh, in a dark way.  
  
'Just a town,' she told herself. 'It'll be fine, unless it's Raccoon City or something.'  
  
She quickly pushed away the thoughts of being assaulted by a horde of grotesque zombies. 'Been plastered to the TV too long.' She kept close to the cliff, digging her fingers into the cracks of the rock to hold herself steady as she slipped down the road with uneven steps.  
  
Eventually, the road split, the right path spiraling on down and the left path barricaded off. Her interests laid not in scaling the barricade in the icy weather, so she chose the path to the right. According to the map, they shared a similar destination, so it didn't quite matter.  
  
Gradually, beginning with bald patches of bare, uniced road, the ice melted away, and the road was simply wet. The sidewalks, however, remained frozen, so she stuck to the road, and paused to collect herself when it spilled into a whole other street where, only a few meters to her right, the road disappeared, crushed away like some giant foot had stepped from the sky and smashed the ground away. But when she approached the remains of the road and peered over, the jumbled mass of dismembered cement blocks, barely connected by pipework, tumbled into nothing, just the gray fog that lay heavily on the town like plague.  
  
Behind her were high fences that hid the private properties of ranches from the civilians of the town. Hazel stepped back from the gorge and left it, her mind still wondering at it. Why was it there, what caused it...  
  
The flower shop looked awfully old, Understandably so, it was celebrating its fiftieth anniversary.   
  
'Wonder if it's open yet.'  
  
The door opened easily.  
  
'Maybe.'  
  
She stepped inside and a thick scent of musty age assaulted her nose. It felt like she breathed in a thick batter of dust and warm, stagnant air. Beyond the aged air was something unplaceable, something that vaguely reminded her of a slab of steak left sitting out on the counter a few months too long.  
  
It didn't require further inspection. Not a living soul existed here, and it had been so for a few years. The fiftieth anniversary must have passed years ago.  
  
A cold shiver that had birthed from her spine the moment she'd set foot in the old building suddenly tore up her back like a parasite. Hazel shook it out, hugged her arms to herself, and took a precarious step.  
  
A glass wall, crusted with dust and what could only be described as red-brown mud, led to an outdoor store of plants, but Hazel ignored it and approached the cashier's desks to her right. It was normal enough, reminding her of the garden shop her mother used to take her to.  
  
Hazel coughed, and the memory was suddenly gone. She studied the machines, willing it back, but she couldn't recall what she had just remembered. With a small groan, she pushed it out of her mind and brushed off the magazine that cluttered the tabletop.  
  
A tabloid. She didn't need the cheap style of the magazine to tell her; the front page revealed all. Silent Hill had it's own tabloid. It seemed fitting, somehow.  
  
According to the 'Silent Hill Word,' 'deformed bones' were found 'arranged in mystical patterns that suggest Satanic worship.' Smaller font beneath the large print provided the hook that the bones might not be that of humans, but those of monsters, as some townspeople seemed to think. The article was not without photographic evidence, but it was only visible on page twenty-three.  
  
'This is stupid.'  
  
Hazel flipped the magazine open to page twenty-three. The entire page was engulfed by the huge, aerial image of an entire cemetery littered with bones. From the high distance, they seemed to be plain, unaltered bones, but the next page revealed deformities and odd accessories attached to them (such as extra limbs and horns) that made her wince slightly. After turning back to the aerial image and studying it for a moment, her eyes picked up the strange pattern the bones lay in.  
  
A circle, filled with three triangles and a number of other shapes and delicate swirls whose detail was lost in the disproportionate bulk of the boned. It made her head ache like pinpricks behind her left eye, like one of her migraines coming on, so she quickly closed the magazine and dropped it onto the countertop.  
  
A shadow stumbled across her peripheral vision. Hazel spun quickly, hesitated, then jogged after the shadow. "Hello?" she called tentatively. At first glance, the room seemed void of any life, save her (even the plants were dead), but further inspection revealed a quaking, wide-eyed child cowering in a corner, his hands clutching his arms tightly. He jumped and squealed when he saw her.  
  
"Hey there," Hazel said softly, approaching him. "You okay?"  
  
He didn't reply, only gazed up at her dumbly, terrified, with those huge, shimmering eyes.  
  
"My name's Hazel. I'm not gonna hurt you."  
  
"You're not Hazel," he breathed.  
  
"What?"  
  
"I want my sister," he whimpered.  
  
"Here." She offered him her hand gently. Her eyed her warily. "I'll help you find her. Do you live here?"  
  
"I did."  
  
"Let's go find your sister."  
  
He examined her eyes, then took her hand slowly and let her pull him up.  
  
"Do you know where she might be?"  
  
"No. We were in the hotel, and I fell asleep, and when I woke up, everything was like this. Everyone was gone."  
  
'Gone,' Hazel thought. 'That's weird.'  
  
"Come with me," she said. "It'll be safer this way." 


	6. Chapter Six

Chapter Six  
  
The young boy didn't take her hand for a moment. He studied her face with a child's paranoia, considered her for a moment, then suddenly dashed at her.  
  
It startled her at first, but the little boy only flung his arms around her neck and buried his face against her chest. His body trembled.  
  
"I was so scared," he whispered. When Hazel recovered from her shock, she stroked his dark head of hair gently.  
  
"It's okay," she murmured.  
  
"Mommy left me at the daycare," he sniffled. "And I fell asleep, and when I woke up, everyone was gone, and now I can't find mommy."  
  
Hazel bit her lip. "We'll find her," she said softly, then instantly regretted her words. 'What if she's dead?'  
  
"Really?"  
  
She discovered the first traces of hope in his voice.  
  
"I promise," Hazel murmured weakly. "But first we have to find a way across that huge chasm in the road."  
  
"Chasm?"  
  
"Um," she said quickly. "It's a big hole-"  
  
"I know what a chasm is," he interrupted. "But what are you talking about?"  
  
"Th-that hole in the road back there." She stood, and he followed her to the entrance to the flower shop. "The huge hole in the-"  
  
Apparently, there wasn't one. Hazel froze in the doorway, gazing blandly at the full, unbroken path of road that led into the town. She bit her lip and refrained from speaking as she crossed over the full road in front of the boy.  
  
He caught up with her quickly. "Are you from the mental hospital?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"Are you a patient at the mental hospital?"  
  
'I'm working on a double major in sociology and...'  
  
"No," she replied. "I'm not insane."  
  
"Do you take care of the sick people there?"  
  
'Summer counseling.'  
  
"Yes. No. I don't know."  
  
"I've seen you there before."  
  
Hazel looked at him sharply. "Seen me where?"  
  
"At the hospital for the crazy people."  
  
"Here?"  
  
He shook his head, but did not speak further. Hazel frowned and continued on.  
  
'Sanders Street.'  
  
"What's your name?" she asked the boy. He didn't reply, and when she glanced over her shoulder, it didn't take Hazel too long to realize that she was alone.  
  
"Jesus Christ," she breathed. A particularly cold wind settled contentedly against her neck like a purring cat of ice. Hazel jogged quickly down the road, her head tearing left and right, but the boy had disappeared.   
  
'Why was he out so early?'  
  
She dove into an alley, clutching her sides for warmth. It was too cold.  
  
"Hey! Little kid!" she called, for lack of a name, but only her own voice responded in an echo. "Where'd you go?"  
  
'Heart too fast. Something about sin.'  
  
Those damn voices again. 'Maybe I am from the hospital for the crazy people.'  
  
He wasn't in the alley. She returned to the street.  
  
'Heart too fast. Something about sin.'  
  
The next alley was empty. The voice in her head grew in both volume and girth, filling her head slowly, like her migraines.  
  
'Heart too fast.'  
  
The next alley revealed nothing to her, no little boy, no trashcans, just a clear, perfect street lined with little perfect garages.  
  
'Something about SIN.'  
  
'HEART TOO FAST.'  
  
Like someone was yelling in her ear. She collapsed to her knees and didn't feel all the individual bits of gravel digging into her knees. Tears burned like a fire behind her eyes, and she could feel her pupils waxing to an unbearable circumference, felt her eyes writhe and stretch like they would burst at any moment.  
  
"I think she's awake," a soft voice whispered.  
  
"Good. We've done all we can do," a similar voice replied. "Now we have to go."  
  
"No," Hazel wanted to say. "Don't go...don't leave me."  
  
"I don't want to go," one protested. "Look at her...she's so pretty. Maybe she can help us. Maybe she's the one they're looking for."  
  
"Shh."  
  
There was a sudden pressure on her legs, then it disappeared. Feet shuffled and a door closed somewhere.  
  
Hazel moaned. Her entire body felt utterly numb. When her eyes finally cleared, though her vision was still hazy, as though she was under the heavy influence of morphine, she was alone in a dark, crimson-colored room. At her left, charred wood smoldered in the remnants of a fire. She expected to find a cat at her feet, but it must have left with the voices, as there was no cat at her feet.  
  
She sat up, swaying slightly, and swung her feet carefully over the edge of the bed. Ragged gray blankets gathered at her waist; she shoved them away sluggishly and stumbled to her feet. The world around her swayed perilously and swam in and out of focus. Her hands waved around in the air and finally clutched at the empty shelf in a bookcase. She raised her head from the ground slowly and gazed at the bookcase to discover that it wasn't empty; the books were pushed incredibly far back-nearly a foot.  
  
With her vision so unclear, she could not read the titles. They majority were old books, gray, black, and brown in color, with golden lettering and peeling covers. She drew her fingers delicately along the spine of one, then wondered why she'd done so.  
  
'I don't belong in here,' she thought, but her thoughts came too slowly. In the darkest corners of the room, something seemed to stir. Hazel spun lethargically and caught herself again on the bookcase so she didn't fall. The shadows seemed to quiver, but then again, she realized it might just be her eyes.  
  
She took a careful step toward it, and the quivering shadow lashed out in anger, whipping a shimmering, wet string out at her. It caught on her arm and tugged away a layer of the sleeve of her jacket. Hazel jolted back, stumbling and crashing into something that felt like a bedside table. Something slid off the smooth wood and shattered into tiny, glittering pieces on the floor.  
  
'I should have a knife in my pocket.'  
  
Hazel kept her eyes on the shadow as she dug her hands into every pocket she could recall on the jacket. She found little, random objects-pieces of paper, a map printed in black ink on an off-white piece of cotton, a small, cardboard packaging box.  
  
No knife.  
  
She knelt carefully and patted her hand against the cement floor behind her until her hands closed around a shaft of glass that remained from what had fallen. Ignoring the tiny pinpricks of pain springing from shards of sharp, broken glass clinging to her skin like barbs, she clutched the rod of glass in a taught fist and drew it back carefully like a spear. The shadow still quivered, but did not attack. Hazel took a piece of glass with her free hand and hurled it at the shadow.  
  
A gut-wrenching squelch and unearthly whine of agony wrenched out from the corner and another string lashed out at her, catching her empty hand and slitting a perfect, smooth gash from the center of her wrist to the first joint of her middle finger. Her voice seemed to burst from her body in a single, tormented cry. How it hurt, the sudden release of pressure from years of taught skin sudden breaking and splitting as far as would allow.  
  
'That'll need stitches,' she thought in an oddly placed moment of bad humor.  
  
The creature shivered and moved suddenly, catching Hazel off-guard and colliding hard with her, thrusting her down to the hard ground. Her head collided with the cement and her voice returned long enough for her to groan as a headache suddenly blossomed at the base of her skull.  
  
In the faint light, the most she could make out was the (vague) form of a human, female torso struggling against a shivering, loose membrane of something graying, torn, and shimmering with something-blood-like a bleeding bruise. Where the tissue broke, a gray, scabbed hand tore at the surface, seizing at the air wildly, too stupid to attempt to tear the skin away and break free. Hazel could feel her body freeze up, felt herself become too terrified to move.  
  
The source of this disgusting, gray skin was back at the corner. Still, on this being, she could find no whips, no string that lashed out at her when she grew too near. For a brief moment, she found herself in control of her body again. The monster wasn't attacking her-it seemed too enamored with attempting to free itself.  
  
'Look for what's going to hurt you.'  
  
She rose shakily and her eyes darted around the thing. From the shock of the moment (Hazel assumed), her vision began to clear and her alertness returned.  
  
'Maybe...I can get out...'  
  
She took a careful step to the side, and the glass crunched beneath her boots. The gray, slimy hand tore in her direction, but was cut short by the skin and slipped back inside the membrane with a disgusting 'slurp.' The being inside seemed to tremble. Hazel turned quickly to search for a door, but she collided with a body that seized her with two strong arms and smothered her mouth with a hand.  
  
"Shh!" he was hissing. "Shut up!"  
  
The face looked familiar. Hazel fell silent and let him turn her and hoist her up. The monster was still trembling and writhing. In its absence of attacking, the man behind her took one step, then stumbled back quickly. A sudden cold washed over her, but only for a moment, and Hazel discovered she was staring at a wall.  
  
"What-the-FUCK-was-that?" she breathed, then struggled and beat at the arms still clutched around her. "Let me go!"  
  
The arms released her and she spun on her savior, livid. "What the hell was that? Who the hell are you? How the hell did you get through that wall?"  
  
In three short exclamations, her energy was spent. She slumped back against the wall and collapsed to her knees. The adrenaline dispersed from her system and the morphine-like drug took its toll again. Her vision, clear in the sudden pounding of adrenaline brought on by the attack by the-the thing, seemed to drop into a pool of water, where things blurred and swam lazily in and out of a strange, sleepy focus. She knew that figure...  
  
"You've been tapped with White Claudia." Last's voice sounded distant and echoed oddly, as though he called to her from down a long hallway. "Maybe you should come with me."  
  
"Sure," she murmured, stumbled to her feet, and collapsed again in his arms. It felt like the right thing to say.  
  
Last was much stronger than he looked. 


	7. Chapter Seven

Seven

Jessie tried the brass knob to the peeling, painted door carefully and jumped slightly as it slipped easily from the door and clattered to the snowy ground. Denver glanced over his shoulder at her, one eyebrow raised.  
  
"You're stronger than you look," he observed.  
  
"The wood's rotting," Jessie replied, flaking away an old chip that dangled where the doorknob once rested. "Who owns this town?"  
  
"Not sure. It might just be free land."  
  
Jessie slipped her thin hand and wrist into the hole and felt around until her fingers brushed the cold brass lock and, with a little difficulty, turned it. She pressed her hip, thigh, and arms against the door and leaned into it, crying in shock as the door collapsed to the ground with her still atop it. A thick, gritty cloud of dust fumed up from the floor.  
  
"You all right?"  
  
"Ouch. Yes."  
  
Denver waved his hand around in the dust, then found Jessie's arm and tugged her to her feet. "Thanks," she said, rather dryly, brushing herself off.  
  
"Wow. Quite the mess."  
  
Jessie looked over her shoulder, following Denver's gaze, and turned. "Wow," she echoed him. "What a...yeah."  
  
Denver entered first, stepping around Jessie and onto the concrete ground. Glass and debris crunched loudly beneath his boots.  
  
"Look."  
  
Jessie seized his arm and led him away from where he headed. "Look," she said again, pointed to a smooth smear of clean cement that led from an open doorway of the room they occupied to the next room and around a corner.  
  
"Someone's been in here," Denver commented in a professional manner. Jessie gazed at him, miffed.  
  
"Thank you, Captain Know-It-All—"  
  
"Do you write your own material?"  
  
"I wasn't finished."  
  
"Continue."  
  
"...Captain Know-It-All, obvious power six-point-five "lets go back to the fucking future, Marty" gigawatts," Jessie said quietly, then coughed. "I wrote that one myself."  
  
"Nice job," Denver murmured, staring at her with a blend of incredulity and admiration. "Why are you being so quiet?"  
  
"Because there might be someone in here." She grinned.  
  
Denver frowned, then turned away from Jessie. "You're a little different outside of the car."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
She followed him along the cleared path through several more rooms, all quite similar. He stopped her as they entered a fourth room and loud, raspy, gurgling breathing filled the room.  
  
'Ugh,' Jessie thought, but said nothing. "They sound hurt. Did you bring a first aid kit?"  
  
"Yes," he replied quietly. "Wait here."  
  
He approached the closed door carefully, drawing a pistol from the holster in his jacket. Jessie, still waiting at the doorway, drew her own.  
  
Denver whipped open the door and, instantly, the putrid smell of burning, rotting flesh swept into the room and seized them both. Jessie retched, but Denver blanched and stumbled out of the doorway, bracing himself against the wall.  
  
"What is it?" Jessie gasped. "What's in there?"  
  
Denver spat and wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve. He simply said, "Don't go in there."  
  
"We have to," Jessie said. "There's someone in there, I can hear it."  
  
"It shouldn't be alive," Denver muttered, shaking his head.  
  
"Then what's breathing?"  
  
Denver shook his head. "It shouldn't be alive..."  
  
Jessie narrowed her eyes. "I'm going in there."  
  
Denver shook his head.  
  
Jessie swept into the room and past him, boldly into the putrid, smelling room; hardly a moment later, quite like Denver, she spun out of the room and braced herself beside him on the wall.  
  
"I told you." Denver laughed softly, mirthlessly.  
  
"What the hell was that?" Jessie breathed, eyes wide.  
  
"A severed body and a hunk of metal on a stick," Denver replied coolly.  
  
Jessie closed her eyes. "Thank you...Captain...yeah."  
  
"Okay. You ready to go in there."  
  
"Yeah. Sure."  
  
Denver entered again first, pinching two fingers over his nostrils. Jessie followed, somewhat warily, behind him, and felt the blood drain from her face as she saw the body before them.  
  
"It's definitely not some random, run-of-the-mill murder," Denver murmured, his voice nasal from his closed nasal passage.  
  
"The smear leading into here is new, but this body is old," Jessie said, tapping carefully at the middle arm piece of the body.  
  
"I'd at least say it's in the third stage of decomposition," Denver replied.  
  
"But it's cut up," Jessie went on, examining the smooth incisions that separated thick, even, perfectly matched chunks of flesh. "And the cuts are old, too. They've deteriorated with the flesh. It looks like it was a pretty clean cut, though."  
  
The gurgling breathing still echoed, louder now in the room.  
  
"Did you study forensics?"  
  
"Yes. I wanted to be a detective, you know. I still do." She rubbed her nose. "You wanna find out where that breathing's coming from? And how many days dead would a third stagie be?"  
  
"Ten...twenty. I think it's inside that hunk of metal."  
  
"He was a healthy guy. Do you have latex gloves in your first aid kit?"  
  
"Several pairs." Denver dug around in his pocket, removed a white box, fished in there for a moment, then tossed her a pair of gloves. "Lets see about this...gurgling. Put your pistol on it, Jessie."  
  
Jessie turned away, tucking the gloves into her jacket and holding her pistol at ready. Denver moved behind the rod and metal statue and, with quite a bit of struggle, topped the chunk over.  
  
The breathing instantly ceased.  
  
Jessie gagged, dropping the pistol and clapping two hands over her mouth. Denver seemed somewhat surprised.  
  
"That's nice," he murmured, slipping his hands into the gloves and carefully tugging at a lock of rumpled, tangled black hair.  
  
"Oh God," Jessie breathed.  
  
"It's just a head," Denver muttered, beginning to circle the stave. "...Oh God."  
  
The white, waxy face stretched long and thin, the chin hanging long inches below where a normal human chin should stretch, cocked to the right. The black eyes still seemed to glitter, unclouded, alive. The matted hair fell over his face, unkempt for years.  
  
"That's disgusting," Jessie whispered.  
  
"It's impaled on this thing," Denver noted, recovering from the shock of the face and tracing a finger along the shaft of the stick. "It looks like the blade of a sword."  
  
"I guess that goes with the body," Jessie murmured, slowly lowering her hands, though still trembling.  
  
"Kinda feels like he's watching you." Denver grinned over his shoulder wickedly at Jessie, who shot back a glare.  
  
"I was gonna take the body, but not now. You can have it. I'll check out the rest of the place. Better yet, I'm just gonna walk back now. This is horrible."  
  
"Wanna be a detective? Get used to it. That thing's dead, it won't hurt you. You take care of the body, it'll look nice on your resume."  
  
"Fine." Jessie snapped the gloves over her hands and removed her jacket. "Hold on to this for me?"  
  
Denver doubled back, but Jessie snatched it away before he could take it.  
  
"Take off those gloves first," she commanded.  
  
Denver grinned, complied, and took the jacket.  
  
"Thanks."  
  
"He's watching you."  
  
"Shut up. Seriously."

..................................

_Black putrefaction.  
  
Body lays neatly on a clean, unbroken glass display case; spine, legs, arms straight; feet pointed up and hands palms-down at the body's side. Most likely male, caucasian, early 30s to late 40s, healthy, castrated, decapitated approx. 2" above shoulders. No skin in fingers, scratches on palms/rest of body to suggest maiming after death—dicing most likely performed postmortem with a heated blade (skin is quite seared on most cuts), quickly after death (cuts have deteriorated with the rest of body). Hands and feet separate from body, not individually severed, move freely, past rigor mortis. Body temp. cold. Sample of several tissues contained within.  
  
Left of body, severed head is stuffed onto blade of a large sword, cut from the body w/o the searing and accuracy of the rest of cuts, probably cause of death, cannot tell if postmortem or not. Face is stretched out to ridiculous length, eyes still glassy though skin is decomposed. Large, deep gash beneath chin may also be cause of death. Head was beneath pyramid- shaped hunk of metal, when we first entered, heard gurgled breathing beneath helmet, ended as soon as we removed it.  
  
Insects have consumed a great deal of flesh, but all insects are dead. Collected parasitoid wasp/larvae and bowfly pupae with egg; limited beetles were present, collected carrion and burrowing; numerous flies existed both on body, floor, and display case, collected some of as many species as I could find, name bow, house, flesh, coffin, and maggots from separate parts of body, labeled for adult fly nearest them and part of body occupied.  
_  
Jessie bit back the urge to chew on the tip of her pencil—who knew what floated around in the air and latched on to it—then tore the paper off the pad, folded it neatly, and dropped it into the main evidence bag.  
  
"All right," she called to Denver.  
  
"All done?"  
  
"Yeah. Can we get out of here now? It's freezing."  
  
"That might be related to the fact that you're wearing short sleeves." He lay the jacket over her shoulders and Jessie deposited the gloves before shrugging into it quickly and thankfully. "But let me grab some pictures and then we'll be off into town."  
  
"Town?" Jessie muttered.  
  
"We're here to find leads on the girls."  
  
"Well, we just found a body," Jessie muttered under her breath. "Sounds a little bit like a lead to me."  
  
"Besides, how do you plan on getting out? The car's a few miles down the road, lodged in snow."  
  
"Might there be a motel or something somewhere around here?"  
  
"Possibly. Not until we find a lead."  
  
"Ugh."  
  
"Persistence is a virtue of detectives. No good detective ever just gave up."  
  
"Spare me the detective talk."  
  
"You want to be one, right?"  
  
"I'm working on it," Jessie murmured, shivering. She turned her eyes from the floor to Denver, who stepped delicately around the body, taking pictures from several angles. He turned his attention to the head, and finally, the hunk of metal on the ground.  
  
"Okay. I'm ready."  
  
"Awesome." Jessie thrust her hands into her pockets. "Get enough pictures?"  
  
"And a few extra. It'll be helpful, I promise.  
  
"You ought to give me some pointers on taking those kinds of pictures sometime."  
  
"Gladly. How about now?"  
  
Jessie shrugged a little. "Sure." She waved for him to exit the room before her and turned to leave, but a glint of metal caught her eye.  
  
At first, it seemed it was only a caption on the wall, but she examined the painting, running her fingers delicately over the surface (though her mother had told her this was a "no-no" many times), and her fingers connected with a metal chip that fell easily from the painting's surface when her finger brushed over it. She caught it in her free hand and examined the triangle-shaped slice of metal.  
  
"Jessie!" Denver called from the front room. "You coming?"  
  
"Hold on," she called back after a moment, then tucked the metal into her pocket and looked up at the painting.  
  
'... Red G.. .. J......'  
  
It was too smudged to read, but something on the picture clicked in Jessie's mind. A man stood in the picture, a tall, strongly-muscled man in a white robe, clutching a huge blade in his left hand.  
  
In place of a head, however, a huge, pyramid-shaped chunk of metal lay over his shoulders.  
  
In the room with the body, a huge, pyramid-shaped chunk of metal lay on the ground.  
  
Jessie shivered. "Denver...you might want to see this."

.............................................................................................................

(Just something I want to clarify here...I am _not_ bringing Pyramid Head or the other one into the story. No no. Just their bodies. I understand how much some of you despise bringing Pyramid Head into stories that have nothing to do with James, and this story has nothing to do with James (or does it, mwahaha?), so, thus, no Pyramid Head. Except his body. )


End file.
